I don’t know if I’m crazy. I know that some people pretty close to me think I am. But how can you tell? All the crazies think they’re sane, and half the sane people think they’re crazy. All I know is that I have this thing inside me that gets heavier and more insistent with each passing day. I feel that to suppress it or to not speak out, would be to commit a grave error.
I don’t know if my musings feed the feeling or stem from it. It’s a chicken-and-egg scenario I don’t have an answer for. And I don’t know if I’m just standing in the echo chamber with all the asylum escapees, parroting what I hear.
The answer to those questions, questions I’ve asked myself hundreds of times in self-examination, is,
“I don’t think so.” I’ve been at pains not to. I don’t deliberately try to make myself feel this way. It’s enormously unpleasant. And it’s only recently that I’ve even become aware that others are saying what I’ve been feeling. I know I’ve addressed what I’m about to tell you previously – as gently and as tactfully as I could. This is an unfolding revelation for me; I didn’t understand back then all that I do now. But I also sense that in the past I’ve tiptoed around what really needs to be said and now it’s time for me to say it plainly.
Normally, I would spend some time building the context for what God has said to me. I can’t do that this time. I don’t know why but I have to speak the thing – the heart of it – to you first. The context (if you’re still with me after this) will have to come later. So, although I had planned to ease in gently over the course of a few posts, I think you’re now going to be the recipients of a frontal assault. However, if you haven’t yet noticed, each post in itself is part of the context of my central theme – that Jesus is coming, in some manner that we are not expecting. Soon. So if you need context, read the previous posts.
Finally, you may also find that I say the same thing in different words (or not) over and over and over. It’s not that I don’t have anything else to say; it’s that I can’t say anything else that I do have. I am, as it were, constrained to speak this until you take notice or switch me off.
I don’t know what’s coming next (honestly), but take a deep breath, we’re going under.
The Word of the Lord to you and to me:
I say that phrase very deliberately, but also very carefully and with much fear. I do not use it lightly.
Ever.
Woe to you who have ears but do not hear, who have eyes but do not see.
Woe to you who go about deaf and blind and naked but do not know it.
The day is coming and is now here – the day I visit you.
Not a day of laughter.
Not a day of peace.
Not a day of jesting.
Not a day to feast.
A day of agony and shock,
where I will catch you by surprise and you will be taken –
caught, as in a snare and unable to escape.
Do not suppose it will be another way.
Do not suppose I have a sign.
For it will come upon you suddenly
and take you without warning
and you will be taken.
There is no time.
There is no time.
Quickly, quickly to the Lord.
Quickly to the Lord.
For he will come without warning and without alarm.
Every face pale.
Every face pale.
Cover your head.
Cover your head.
Cover your head.
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When I sat down to write, I had no idea what was going to come out. I certainly had no idea it would be that. I had no draft. I had no notes. I sat down and wrote “The Word of the Lord” and I began to weep. I sobbed uncontrollably. And I covered my head in terror.
Now that I’ve written it, I know that is the thing; that is the heart of the matter. It’s no longer that time is short.
Time is spent.
Whatever your habits are, if they are of no eternal consequence, drop them. Now.
If television, or fashion or pornography or sport or drinking with the mates or social media or anything consumes much of your time, more than it should; if you spend more time doing things for yourself than things that are done with or to God – let them go.
God has been shaking the earth – metaphorically and quite literally. And that shaking is only going to intensify
For,
“In just a little while,
he who is coming will come
and will not delay.”
(Heb.10.37)
[So] Go, my people, enter your rooms
and shut the doors behind you;
hide yourselves for a little while
until his wrath has passed by.
See, the Lord is coming out of his dwelling
to punish the people of the earth for their sins.
(Is.26.20-21)
I know I sound ridiculous. I know people will think I’m scaremongering. I know sin and God being angry are ideas that are scorned and reviled, both outside and inside the church today. I know that if I speak about judgement – however I speak of it – it will incur the opposition and vitriol of many Christians, particularly those who cannot reconcile it to a now very fashionable Father of love. I know all of that. And yet I speak.
God knows my heart. I do not speak to cause offense. I am not afraid to stir up controversy but I do not deliberately court it nor do I seek to hurt the faith of others. But I am first and foremost a messenger and a forerunner. That is my calling. When I am called to speak, it is for a significant reason. If I am asked to run it means only one thing, for that is the one thing I was made for.
If it offends, I am in good company, and before you dismiss the message out of hand, you should consider firstly why it does so. To fail to do this is to do so at your own peril.
In a few days I will begin to build some context to these bold claims I have made. If you have managed to make it this far with me I hope you will hang on a little longer so that I can explain to you why what I am saying is actually God’s message of hope to us and not the rantings of an angry God or, worse, an angry messenger.
-gb
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